Solitary Requeim
by blindtaleteller
Summary: Crossover fic between FF VII and Kingdom Hearts II: contains a lot of OCs.This Prelude Chapter begins about 34 through the overall saga. THERE WILL BE SOME YAOIYURI IN LATER CHAPTERS:GET USED TO IT. OCs belong to me,The rest belong to Squeenix & Disnix.
1. Prelude Greiving for the Present

_" 'The End' is an oxymoron in and of itself my dear boy. To believe that a story --or life-- ends with death, or such simple words while there still is life: is utter foolishness to those of us who bear a soul. "_

_Oracle Tsu: 1449 BF, Sa Neng Clan Territories, The Judgment of Alta_

_**The keys are in place**_.

The skies in the east are dark. Deep hues of green and utter black dancing with the threat of lightning on the horizon, one outside of their world might consider the prelude to a hurricane or tornado looming at the rough fingertips of the wind god's hands ready to be loosed from it's leash. Still the sun shone down from the opposite side.. brightly draping through the heavy morning mists, and cutting softly through the salt of the cold tide that surrounded the only land mass situated in the churning and unending seas. His pale serpentine eyes slid over the familiar storm evenly, and as a seasoned farmer might.. he easily discerned the lay of his homeland's weather. Winter would be coming soon. Earlier than the year prior.. and more acidic than before.

It was an odd daze he was in, roaming the pass ahead of the carriers in his place as ruling Kanji: and ahead of the dead they bore on their shoulders. The fifth war of his lifetime. His chin turned and he looked solidly over his shoulder at the drolling populace that marched behind him along the emerald strewn passes between the mountains, the sharp blue of the Undine Shores now not so far. So many more to lay to rest in the arms of the Mar. So many years of corpses yet before them. How could it all have ended in a single night?

Perhaps, he was in denial: he thought as he faced forward again.. not needing to put his silvery blue eyes to the path to know the way. Two thousand years had passed. His mates had calmed and taken their place within the palace walls. His uncles ad slept, and risen.. and slept again beside their charges as Judici. Oracle had likewise woken.. asking for his father. Always, asking for him: and his mother. Still he had no answers for in any of those instances.

He sighed as the hooves of his Kataran hit the soft give of sandy earth marking their passage into Mar territory. The Sea-lings knew what his presence meant.. even if they didn't smell the approaching death bore on the backs of his father's subjects. He heard their moving with his sharp Lupene ears.. slipping into the water with speed and grace befitting the merfolk they were: to await their offering and their duty out of the sight of the living who still to this day feared them.

The Kataran balked and steered itself sideways near the breaking point: the high reflective stones that marked the point of no return for all without mourning. He left it behind with a simple turn and slide from his mount.. and drew back his hood to look back at the mountain one more time before his duties in his father's absence would be put to task.

He had aged, in many ways, since those first days of return. " Kiros! My lord Proteus! " Their world had died and been reborn two thousand fold since, as it always had.. and as it always would, until his father returned and claimed his truest right as claimed King. Kiros' eyes steadied on the Sunset Palace of Maladies, his thoughts drowned in the past, and seeking the future. " Proteus.. do you hear me? "

The voice was much closer this time.. an arm's reach away, and Kiro's blank gaze reached the face of Gizale's nephew. Only a few meager centuries old.. and the boy had more scars than even Kiros himself, or his slumbering uncle Yazoo. He had proven himself over and over; to be better in honor than the man and wife that sired him. " I hear you, Deidran. " and Kiros' eyes returned to the palace briefly before turning to the cobalt shore churning some hundred yards from the razor stones that pointed their path. " The future, catches my mind is all. Tell the carriers to unbind the dead and set with them their offerings. The Mar and great mother await their passage and return. "

Deidran bowed his head and went about that business as Kiros was once again the first to step upon the black and pearl whirled sand. He stopped halfway to meeting of the tide and parted his hands from his side, opening his palms to the horizon, his chin turning towards the brighter clouds that danced with the bright hues of the sunset, closing his eyes and taking the knowledge provided by the silently coming dusk. So many memories waved through his mind...

" I ... refuse. "

He could remember the dead silence from, well, everyone. So quiet that her footsteps could be heard on the carpet. It had actually angered him: though now in hindsight he realized he should have expected it long before they had returned " All of this.. all your efforts.. to deny your union? "

" Yes. "

" Why in the name Halsethsis? " Jasper had been tugging on his sleeve. He hadn't looked back, but now, two millenia later on that toothily edged shore: he did. His youngest brother's form stayed as it had been for the past four hundred years since their father's departure from this very spot: frozen in the black depths of stone with his Way To The Dusk keyblade extended to the horizon, his features a blur behind the whirl and chip of onyx like jewel. Forever holding the doors to their world shut tight against any who did not belong.

Safekeeping their present and new generations from outside aggressions.. whilst they dealt with those that remained from within. The carriers began to bring out the dead in solemn columns. Some were too horribly gnarled or even rotted from the past months of battle in the White Vale to even show their faces to the sky, veiled in a complete death shroud. This, he despised: there was no easy way to identify those he most wanted to bid a fair parting, and those he would wish into the dripping pits of the hells.

Others, he recognized more easily; their stilled mortal wounds marked with gilded bindings. Death-deep wounds bound in the most delicate of finery. Again his memories surged to the surface.

" You cannot abandon your blood! And what of her.? "

" Kiros.. "

" No Jasper, you yourself sought them for how long? And Yazoo? And Loz, and Kadaj? Our uncles sought for us as much! What of Axel and Demyx if not them? Saix? Four ye-- "

" I don't want it either. " Jade's quiet voice still sounded weak in his memory, clear as day and quiet as a whisper: but the words had been enough to make his heart stop for an instance in disbelief. It had been then, looking back to his uncles and brothers that he had realized he hadn't seen something.. something they had realized that had slipped by him: and he finally looked to Jade, whose eyes slid up to her halted other half with restrained emotion.

It had been then he had noted the excessive stiffness to her back, and smelt the damp salt in the air. Tears. It had nothing to do with them, and her last words to them before she left proved it solidly as she had opened the door and simply left. " Even bound together.. we can never be whole again. Not ever. " He had looked to Arcxan, one half of his brother.. and found the tallest staring at the floor, his eyes hidden behind his hair. Thinking back, they had been more perceptive than he had then: that was why they hadn't protested to her claim. He knew that now, and he knew it moments later. Lupene ears did not deceive, much to his heart's detriment.

No one else had heard the name that was on her lips as she had made her way out of their sight never to be seen again to this very day; but Kiros understood with that simple uttering, and knew her heartless had felt it when his eyes turned to see her clasping at the bracelet around her wrist with a deep set painful frown: on the edge of tears that wouldn't come, because they had already been spent for him in the nights prior.

Kiros stayed in this daze of memory for what seemed like an eternity.. helping to prepare the dead as he had before; laying the spry Calla in the hands of the loyal and loving servants of the crest. Taking up the bindings of the first fallen was a haze of movement beyond the years and centuries. The wars that had since come and gone, and the battles within each. The loss of Lotos and Alta the Third. Bor's brother, and Kinneas. Half the Valkries had faded into the waves and thus the hands of god as well. And ever his father had been there.. until the light had faded from his wife's third pyre. Until the third Funerary, and the last braid to honor the dead of the lands and peoples under his subjection had been added to his hair. Since Rubi had been taken into the last order, and brought to the altars a wife of Deidran's half brother.

Four hundred years.. his mind wandered again to the present as he felt the sharp hands of the Mar grasping at the dead he pulled on his shoulders from beneath the waves. Letting loose the ties from his hands he watched in silence as the shrouded bodies were dragged down and away beneath the dark waters by their keepers. He spoke his words as his father spoke them before him, a memory and a promise for so much more in his voice: harshened at the closed horizon and those they had left beyond it at Sephiroth's final standing command. The sound carried out across the waters, deepened by the hush of waves rushing to the shore. " As you rose here from death, so do you sink into new life. As you were once born from these lands, do so again. Find peace in passage, from this to the next eternity.. and begin again without need for regret nor for recompense. Fly thee free into the arms of the Gods without any need but for thy own judgment, secure in this: we shall meet again, be it in this flesh: or in new blood and bone hewed by their grace in need. "

The waters glow did not frighten Kiros as it once did, and the same name that Xadje had uttered as her last word to be heard came across his lips in memory and wonder if father had ever found them.. or if he was still looking for the broken shards of Jade... their family.. were they even still alive? " Bilxt.. "

Standing in the waters only one answer could come to him: nothing had been finished in truth. Those days had simply marked the end of one dark chapter.. and looking at the dead as they were still and yet carried past him, Kiros knew that until their world was claimed and Etri became one with his father's choice: they would continue to be forced to wait for the next chapter to begin..


	2. Ch1 Passing the Torch

**_Open the Door._**

Jaina stood in silence beside her mother, in reverent line with the rest of the order. A mere two hundred and twenty years old, she was the middle child; but the most patient, the most observant. It showed as she saw he brother shift his stance uncomfortably in his place a few yards ahead to her left, and noted the slight sway of the tip to his pike before Halas quickly kicked him in the shin from behind to get him back on the seriousness of the funeral rites. She might have smiled and laughed at the sudden jerking return to her brother's posture into the attentive state, and the grumbling he was no doubt doing behind his faceguard: if she didn't understand and feel the heavy weight of the stark truths lingering in the air.

She had never met her grandfather. Never known the kind of man he was or the faces of her uncles so long lost: but she knew very well when Uncle Kiros was thinking about and mourning their memory.. as well as the memory of the man trapped in stone beside her: whose face she had tried so many times to see through the heavy glaze of the dark reflective stone he remained frozen in. Her eyes shifted from the parting waters briefly to his outstretched hand and the likewise timeless blade held pointing at the horizon that was only visible in silhouette now that the setting sun was --from her perspective-- shining behind it.

One thing she marked in her observations that she doubted anyone else had and intended to ask her mother about: the deep dark to her uncle's stoney prison had become more translucent since the last Funerary. Motion beyond her point of focus caught her attention, along with the gasps of breath that followed the white clad figure forward through the stilled crowd to the parting glow of the tide. It was her mother's almost hiss of an intake of a word and immediate following to one knee with the rest of the elder Valkrie that caught sight of her: that made her realize that she should be doing the same. " ..oracle.. " was a title spoken in reverence on all occasions, and another that Jaina had never laid eyes on in her sparse two hundred years. It was enough to raise her chin and look.. in time to see the others pass her as well.

Three men, black and silver clad: took places at either side behind her.. all but one blank spot on her right.. open as though another unseen soul might still be standing there as her Uncle turned from his duties to see the one who owned the title being murmered across the lips of every mourner, man woman and child. Though she had never seen the Oracle or her Judici.. never been allowed within the Slumbering Wiles: Jaina knew who most of them were.. and that one in particular was a blood relation. He was easy to make out among them; tall, thickly muscled, with short stark silver waved hair that tapered near the back of his head. Loz's arms crossed over his chest, his back to Jaina and everyone else as he stood his ground at the Oracle's left side as was his duty: and she raised her hand to the waves her uncle stood in and then above her head.

The breathing even of her uncle was likely paused as the onyx haired Oracle raised her voice to clarity that rivaled the winter thunder before the Proteus could utter a word of question, the old tongue humming words off in quick revelation. The Oracle's fingers spread and lightless lightning arched from the white clouds to her fingertips. The whole crowd jumped.. except her Judici.. except her Uncle.. except her Mother. And glancing to those of them whose faces she could see who hadn't flinched with the roaring sound and it's echoes: Jaina knew before it began that something was happening: she could feel the surge in her very bones.

The sea of dead bore up like a tidal wave, drawing back behind her uncle far from the shore that had been.. and for once she saw the faces of the stark pale Mar barely poking from that eerily unmoving wave: arms and hands clasped to their prizes illuminated by the glaring of the setting sun behind it: fins spread wide and fluttering in the water like butterfly wings to keep them in place. Even the crass Undine listened intently when the Oracles woke, she realized.

She was stricken though.. for once to speak, quietly in question to the red haired woman that bore her into Etri.. into the Purgatory of Worlds. " ..mother..? "

" hush jaina. "

Her mother was then summoned with a simple wave from one of the Judici away from her to the forefront. " Five hundred years have passed. " echoed clearly from Tsu in the tongue Jaina knew better. Loz shifted his stance.. and for a moment, she swore his head inclined to the empty spot that stood at the Oracle's opposite side. " Divided we have stood for too long. The doors of Fayte open to pass the torch from one layer to the next: from one generation to the next. They, passing between the frame of these doorways.. " a long pause, and for some reason, Jaina looked up and to her left again. Instead of a dark outline, something shone brightly by comparison.. metallic and taunting: tugging at her innards to be touched. So close .. a set of chains dangled from it.. one bore the third sun and the other bore the crescent moon. She hadn't ever seen that. " ..exchange truths; the keys to the final laps of time. To make what was rended whole at last. To bring the wayward home... "

Jaina looked back. Maybe she was seeing things.. but.. the handle of her uncle's blade was pointed at her head.. bare and gleaming as if in offer. The stone had receded. She could almost see Jasper's face, and it was saddened beyond compare. It wasn't her intention to actually take the hilt in hand. Her formal armor was difficult to oust from the sand after having been pulled down the rest of the way by her mother. The weight of that look on his face had made her forget herself, where she was and what all else was going on in pure curious compassion for her blood: and she had taken the hilt firmly in hand to help her up without thought.

It was the panic in her Uncle's voice from behind her at the exact moment the buzz of energy passed up her arm and the keyblade came free with ease and a lightness in her limbs that made her realize she may have done something very wrong. " Jaina no! " And turned every head in her direction. Every head except that of the Oracle, and her great uncle Loz. Observant, she realized.. they expected this. That was why Loz held Kiros back with one arm while as if waiting for that, the wave behind him crashed apart in the middle: merfolk, shrouded corpses and all.. and the light of the passed dead that the Mar normally harvested and released into the easternly storms flew screaming like honed pure lasers straight to the horizon: swarming and exploding like so many fireworks against the distant waters like a fourth sun rising in the hard lined shape of a distant doorway that faded as quickly as it was revealed.

She could hear the murmers of shock. Very few could she make out as something thick hit the sand behind her with a muffled thunk. Those she could were mostly in pieces.

By the gods she's broken the lock..

is she mad?

What of the hindlands? Will the Lupes have seen..?

..how did she do that at all?

Kadaj shall hear of this. Lady Rubi is likely to have an earful...

...look, she's freed the lord Judici.

That last fractional portion whirled her around from the wide eyed stare she had on the crowd, and the sight behind them as the water settled again. There in the sand, lay her uncle Jasper.. free of his four hundred year bonds, unconscious and breathing. It was then that she realized.. the blade was still in her hand. The blade that had kept them locked safe behind the closed doors of their world while in his. She was in so much trouble.

" Ooooh crap. " was all she could think of: and someone apparently thought her predicament was funny, by the deep wry laugh that came across nearby.

**_A King Will Return._**

What had happened was still sinking into Jaina's head, her eyes stuck on the keyblade in her hand again, mostly sound registering as she barely noted that the mild laughter was quieting the mourning attendants. She brought the Way to the Dusk up a little higher to get a better look at it as a " hmph. " ended the laughter, holding the thing in her hand but still in disbelief that it had happened; the backdrop of her fallen uncle in the sand just inside that confirming sight: and another tone and voice she didn't recognize cut in at about the same near distance. " About damn time. " was almost cut off by the one who had been laughing, and who was suddenly much closer.. nearly over her shoulder.

" Is no one going to tend Jasper. " sounded more like a clear toned demand than question, and several men -- Jaina' brother included -- rushed at those words to he uncle's unconscious armored form where he had crumpled to the sands of the Undine Shores to work him up out of it and try to wake Jasper. Whose command was so respected or feared aside from the Proteus that they would jump so quickly to obey it?

That question turned Jaina back again from her nerved shock and gaze between the pristine keyblade in her hand and to the slightly lopsided and tall cloaked man so very near her. His hood drawn back, the right shoulder seemed larger than the left; as tall as her great uncle Loz .. whom was the one apparently to have spoken to him. There was a buzz in her thinned calamitous blood that told her he was family, and as her eyes swept up over the tucked length of silver hair and stark silvery chemical green of his eyes it was confirmed he was definitely one of 'The Original Sins'.

But which one? She'd never seen him before. Trying to place him, it was then when his eyes' study came to her face in return; that she realized why she hadn't seen him before, and where he had come from: seeing the last sliver of light left on the horizon from that opened door vanish entirely from the darkening dusky sky. " Double crap. " raised one of his silvery brows and lifted one corner of his otherwise stern mouth to put some form of humor into his features. Jaina, didn't find it that funny.

" I believe.. " the tall silver haired man started clearly and commanding of presence as he brushed one of his long thick braids back behind his shoulder, Jaina swallowing under the odd steadiness of his gaze. " ..an explanation is in order? " And again.. it was less a question, and more a demand. A soft hit to his shoulder from Loz managed her great uncle a mild look of irritation as he said " I was starting to think I wasn't going to see your face again, brother. "

" I do not die so easily as the passing of a mere few hundred years, Loz. You should know that by now... "

Was this Kadaj then? Jaina's curiosity got the better of her then and she leaned slightly forward and up. Loz chuckled softly behind a hand before stroking his chin at her expression. If it was, he didn't much look like she had expected. Mother had always described him as a thinner man than the one standing in front of her. Then again, more than a few years had passed. She was about to finally open her mouth and ask when he looked beyond her and then over the heads closest to ask himself, waving one set of fingers at Jaina mildly. " Is someone going to answer me? Whose child is this? "

That hadn't been the sort of question Jaina had been expecting, nor was it how she had interpreted what he'd requested earlier, raising her brow high in his general direction; but it was her mother who quickly stepped up to Jaina's side and put her hand to her shoulder answer, smiling brightly: and delivered another shock to Jaina's ears from her lips that explained everything as the Proteus her uncle cam up alongside Loz and the Oracle behind him. " She's mine poppa. My third child since your departure... "

Jaina stared in curious new wonder at the man standing there then, dumbstruck for the moment with loose lips. This was not her great uncle Kadaj. Loosening his cloak, the feathered reason his shoulder was lop sided unfurled as he came entirely clear of it in new and as equal a study of her as she was giving him. This was her grandfather.. this was..

" Welcome home by the way, Sephiroth. " was barely registered as a chuckling passage from Oracle as she began moving for the stone crags that marked the borders of the Undine Shores in the background. The thought finally registered that Jaina had no say in whether or not the door had been opened. Oracle had said it. It had been time, time for her grandfather to come home. Time for Eternal Horizon's King to return to his throne. their thoughts felt as hough they came together just then as she straightened her chin and finally introduced herself to her grandsire with no small amount of her own stern pride. " My name is Jaina, daughter of Rubi and Marsus. "

He smirked as though he were somehow amused, his single black wing settling in he mild wind from the seas. She could be proper when she needed to be. " As no one else seems to remember to say it but the Oracle, even with her reminder.. I welcome you home, grandfather. " and she pointed the blade then to the likewise settling waters, and the dead within them. It felt natural already to have it there. " A great deal's happened in your absence Father Flame Tamer.. "

His head turned slightly in that direction ad Kiros sighed.. half in exhaust for the nature of the shore, and half in relief for the fact his father was home again. His mates would be both pleased, and uncertain of Sephiroth's return.. only one of them had ever crossed his path before, and even then she had been nervous beyond compare. " I see. I have duties already to tend to. " snapped Kiros' head up from his thoughts. He saw it in is father's features, his past small affections, but slightly brighter for Jaina as his eyes had turned back to her. His voice was calm and even as it ever had been. " Best to get them done then, before the Mar have at their screeching fits. Help with your uncle. I will continue with this, Jaina. Then we go home, and the lot of us will hold proper council. "

A simple nod was all needed, and all he recieved: from Jaina anyway. Beyond her, Sephiroth's eyes lingered on the woman in white who had paused at the Shore's border with a return of that near emotionless stern gaze to his face. She did not have to look at him to pass that message on, or even speak it. He had returned alone. None of his children, nor his wife or even brother had been with him. She would be waiting for him, near the fount waters as usual. But this time he would not be going out from the gate of their world to continue the search or attempt the breach of the sealed worlds after...


	3. Ch2 Back to Work

_Love, my endless Love._

_Fresh and foolish I had forgotten._

_Young and carefree I turned away._

_Granted, I smiled with you at my back._

_Granted, I stepped to far away._

_Had I not stretched that golden chord too far_

_had I held you sooner to my chest,_

_would you be so far at my back?_

_Love, my endless Love._

_Fresh and foolish I had abandoned._

_Young and carefree I lost you._

_Where are the songs of your footsteps behind me?_

_Where is the warm hand at my shoulder?_

_Snapped away, snapped away;_

_I grasp backwards now,_

_where I once moved forward._

_" Grieving Soul "_

_Songs of the Judici Courtships; Gizale Winsbane : 174th Festival of Commune_

_-_

_**Memory's candle burns alone in sorrow, determination, and lust for hope.**_

The first thing he heard was the ringing of his own ears. The blood rushing back into motion after who knew how long set a staggering ache into his flesh and bone. Vexen had been wrong.. he had been aware, or at least: aware enough to dream. And those dreams had been so cruel: hanging onto a lingering hope that had long ago been captured by icy catlike mint green eyes, hopes he had realized, and taken for granted as returned. He'd lost, no: weakened, the last warmth in the long string of what connection there was between himself and his heart when he'd done that: and realized it far too late. Ever since, he had been grasping, reaching back and trying to catch anything she might give him... anything: even her mocking distaste for that old and unintentional betrayal.

He heard the hissing release of his chamber, felt the rush of colder air from his thaw; and his sterile green eyes opened slowly, lacking focus for anything beyond fuzzy base shapes, the contrast between shadows and light at the moment. Regardless, he knew his surroundings and reached fumblingly for the grit-slicked edge of the glass and alloyed chamber he himself had helped build: a hundred questions rushing through his head as he pulled himself forward to his unsteady feet from the semi-vertical lay he had been frozen in. What day was it? What year, for that matter? Was someone else there, or --and he swallowed dryly at the thought-- had his chamber timed out as Vexen warned him it might, if her status remained as it was and dragged out too long for it's energy source to hold up his his vitals?

" Hello? " Some part of him half panicked with no immediate answer as his lean clothed form thumped to a rest forced by his dizzy waking state: trying to clear his head: a whirring white noise barely entering his ears past the slowly subsiding ring and thrum of his own blood. How long had he been frozen?

He practically jumped out of his skin when a speaker nearby crackled to life " Welcome back to the land of the living mate! " he familiar tones and accent pulling a dry groan from deep in his chest as lights began to flicker on at a low dim level, his voice was weak, throat still dry from his thaw. " God dammit Luxord.. "

A softer chuckling and then clucking of the Brit's tongue made him grimace as he tugged back his hood, the long red braid he'd grown over the years prior to his stasis tumbling out towards and over the side he was leaning on. " You've been asleep a long time Eight... " Axel could tell that much as his eyes began to clear, picking up the details: specifically the hick layers of gritty dust and general disarray of age to the once pristine room. " Fuck man.. " he gripped his head as he stepped away from and out of the chamber entirely, his boots disturbing a good three inches of caked, fluff topped grime as they hit the floor. " ..you aren't kidding. Where is everybody? "

The speaker's unresponsive quiet made him look back at it with a slight rub to his head as the lights continued to flicker on through the huge and empty room " Rechecking their status, my files say if you want company aside from me; you'll have to either wake them up or catch up to them at home base. " Axel made a confused expression, near a snarl as Luxord continued: his head instantly cleared " I've sent the proper signal to the tower as I've been programmed to do -- "

" Wait wait wait wait.. whoa whoa whoa.. " Axel's hands went up shaking back and forth at shoulder level as he verbally cut him off " Home Base? Programmed? What the hell man..? The _tower_? Didn't Jasper and Kadaj scare them all off the property after they found out we were going forward with the preservation project? " Still waiting for an answer, he whirled around to head at least to the sealed locker his things had been placed in. He didn't want to waste time

" ...That's correct. Sorry luv, my databanks were experiencing a tad of lag there for a tell. It's been a very long time: some of these files are so corrupted it's taking minutes to fix them. " the way that comment came across braced his mind a bit and held him off asking just how much time had passed. " Try to keep it short.. but fill me in on what you just said first. Before _that_ though... " a rub to his throat from his dirtied hand cleared a little of the rasp, blinking heavily into the much brighter light of the hall through the archway he was now standing in. He still hadn't seen anyone: though given what he did understand of what was said he wasn't as surprised, just wishing someone had been there to greet him. Even Jasper would be a welcome sight at this point. The place was eerie with no one in it. " The plumbing still working? 'Cause _damn_ do I feel like I need a shower and drink. " Motion at the end of the hall made him squint and then smirk when he recognized it, one of his bots scurrying back and forth along the floor as another one entered and whirred it's way up the dingy arched wall and ceiling in a likewise sweeping motion, cleaning the mess whatever amount of years had put into the building's interiors.

" Yes it is, and that's quite understandable mate. " made him jump a little when the voice came up with another, newer bot version he didn't quite recognize: the sound emanating from it's speakers. He eyed it wearily before he started down the hall towards the lockers, the taller bot following close behind. " Used for that amount of time, the older stasis chambers tend to give your skin a little itch: and, they don't do much for the contents of your stomach either as I've been told. Not that I'd know, being artificial intelligence. There's food here waiting for you too; though I can't guarantee the flavor as it's only replaced every few years. "

" Itch nothing.. I feel like it could crawl right _off_ me.. " which was the truth. He looked at his gloves now, inspected his clothes. The cold had cracked the surface, made it a little too brittle for his liking.

" Oh, yes.. that's right, and your new uniform is waiting for you in your locker. The Organization hasn't worn that style in centuries. "

Axel stopped in his tracks, staring straight ahead with that last word, repeating it out loud. " _Centuries._" His hand came up in front of his face again as the program actually sighed.. turning it around and back again: clenching his fist hard and watching the thick leather split as he passed at a slow even stride into the cleaner half of the hall and the doorway the bots had come from, he would be glad they'd cleaned that first; if he'd thought about it. He wasn't, and didn't. An almost emotionless frown on his features, he peeled the brittle glove away. " So then; lemme guess. _Why_ you've been avoiding giving me a time line or directly answering my questions so far... is that, the battery on my chamber finally died out. _And._. " he sighed, shaking his head as he turned into the storage lockers that precursored the showers specifically for when the Organization, or members of the Commission woke, his hand raising with a finger pointed at the ceiling, though he had to clear his throat again as he shook that finger, before he could say anything " ..who.? Vexen? Saix? Which one of them thought I'd have a mental breakdown when I was told? "

Another sigh. " Both actually, and my respectfully handsome biological template agreed. "

Axel huffed a single laugh at the ego in the end of the confirmation. " I don't have to guess who poked his nose into your programming process with that comment. " a slight sigh from the Flurry as he came to his locker, he shot back over his shoulder at the bot. " If you've got arms tucked into that torso of yours, I wouldn't mind that drink about now. Water, preferably. " and rubbed his throat again as he recalled the combination.

" Sure thing luv. " as it backed up left him prying the sealed closet open browsing over his things and raising a brow as his eyes came across the newer clothes hanging to his right when he had to turn on the light. "_...ew._ " He fingered the god awful cloak with no small measure of distaste. He could easily guess who had designed it; one thing Axel and a rare few others had known about the Superior, was that he was literally color blind: a fact that had played a part in previous decor and uniform choices, at the knowledgeable 'urgings' of himself and a few others. The ugly-as-sin thick stitched green and violet design proved one thing to his mind as his lip curled at it, dropping the sleeve again. Even the black accents couldn't save the outfit from being an eyesore, as well as proof to that somewhat annoying thought. " I see Xemnas is still alive. "

The bot pulled up just outside the wide locker with a mock laugh: apparently it'd been recorded, because it skipped before the sound stopped. Axel reached for the water and all but chugged it down. " And kicking, mate: and kicking. Lord Zexion made the same assessment when he saw the uniform, though he wouldn't tell me why. " Axel's eyes dulled with the mention of Zexion's name. So he was still alive. Lord? Well that had to make his already swelled ego just burst straight out of his head. He wondered, if he'd changed much more than he had during the Catalyst, or if he'd found his brother.. for that matter: he still wondered if his brother was still alive to be found. " Dispatch has responded and Commission officials are on their way to greet you, by the way. It'll be an hour or so I think. Portals still aren't allowed within the Crisis Store. "

Axel wiped his mouth, eying that ugly uniform " Well lucky me. Either way, I'm _not_ wearing this nasty piece of shit. Xemnas can kiss my_ ass_ as far as that's concerned.. " before his head turned the other way, looking to a much older trunk in the corner, and holding up his other still gloved hand to fist that one as well, the same splitting affect a result. He sighed. " Back to basics for me I guess. **Ha!** Old School Lea-style suddenly has a new depth to the meaning, don't it? "

" Pardon? "

" Translation: I'd rather wear the clothes the old fuckers _found_ me in on recruitment, than even _touch_ that useless gaudy scrap again.. got it memorized? " he easily quipped with a forefinger briefly placed to his temple as he turned for the trunk, and flipped it open; a lot of memories laid to rest jumped out at him, but especially one.. the soft polish of the thick links to the gold bangle glaring up at him set on top of it all: right where he'd left it. A deep, shattering frown wasted his features: and he immediately teared up against his will, pressing his lips hard together. It felt like an eternity standing there staring at the jade lined braclet before he heard the wheels of the bot climb up over the edge of the locker, and his head turned very slightly towards it " Axel? " his eyes didn't leave the bangle. He cleared his throat, closed his eyes and composed himself before the tears could grow enough to fall: picking it up and latching it around his wrist. It was still tight, but then; it wasn't his. " _Right_. Game face. Time to brush up.. " he said stiffly as he dropped the old cloak in a heap behind him, reaching for the blood red and onyx black clothes he'd been found in at the start of his own journey. " ..tell me the important stuff, and be short about it. I can get the rest from the guys. "


End file.
